Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Ball v.1.43

Here's what I've decided about our boy Andrea Bargnani after reading yesterday's comments: He is a polarizing figure. He's Vernon Wells, or Larry Murphy... our own Sarah Palin.

All that being said, I still maintain he doesn't get enough credit for how unique of a player he is...

So, here are a few more ways Bargnani is a unique player:

MOST CAREER 3PT FG
7-0 OR TALLER

Dirk Nowitzki 1131
Andrea Bargnani 430
Arvydas Sabonis 136
Vlade Divac 100

HIGHEST CAREER FT%
7-0 OR TALLER

Dirk Nowitzki 87.6%
Yao Ming 83.2%
Andrea Bargnani 81.5%
Brook Lopez 81.0%
Yi Jianlian 80.5%

LOWEST REBOUNDS PER 36 MINUTES
7-0 OR TALLER

Brad Sellers 5.4
Nikoloz Tskitishvili 5.7
Andrea Bargnani 6.0
Jason Collins 6.6
Daniel Santiago 6.6

STAT OF THE DAY

So, he's unique. Can we all agree on that? Anyways, here's the biggest reason why I'm bullish on Bargnani: Check out the various per game categories he's improved in two straight seasons

Minutes
Field Goals
FG%
3PT Att
Off Reb
Def Reb
Blocks
Points

Again, will it all likely lead to a 35-win season... Perhaps. But I'm starting to think Bargnani averages 20+.

10 comments:

MC Welk said...

To these eyes Okur is as tall as Bargnani, and has more 3-pointers.

khandor said...

1. As Bargnani's Pts and MP have steadily increased over the last 4 years, this is what the Raptors' W-L records have been:

2006-2007, 1629/MP, 751/Pts, 47/W
2007-2008, 1861/MP, 792/Pts, 41/W
2008-2009, 2453/MP, 1202/Pts, 33/W
2009-2010, 2799/MP, 1376/Pts, 40/W
2010-2011,?/MP, ?/Pts, ?/W

Conversely, this is what those same stats look like for the first 5 years of Nowitzki's career in Dallas:

1998-1999, 958/MP, 385/Pts, 19/W
1999-2000, 2938/MP, 1435/Pts, 40/W
2001-2002, 3125/MP, 1784/Pts, 53/W
2002-2003, 2891/MP, 1779/Pts, 53/W
2003-2004, 3117/MP, 2011/Pts, 57/W

2. If Bargnani averages 20 pts next season, what does it really matter in the grand scheme of things?

3. Bargnani's name does not warrant inclusion in any basketball-related article which also deals with the abilities of Dirk Nowitzki.

4. IMO, Bargnani is only a polarizing player for those fans who don't truly value being able to compete for a league championship.

Anonymous said...

So it seems that Bargnani's 09-10 season looks a lot like Dirk's 99-00 season. Andrea just took longer to get up to speed. Maybe we will win 53 games as well? Just saying . . .

Anonymous said...

Caldeford,

I fell you should start naming your posts again, instead of Ball V. If you want to read an archived article from a couple years ago, the titles are very helpful.

Keep up the good work,

G

Anonymous said...

Ball is definitely getting old and we're done with Hedo.

Anonymous said...

Khandor,

Please stop with your stupid arguments. Don't read Caldeford's blog if you don't like it. Caldeford's blogs have been way way better than yours.

Alex said...

Caldeford,
I've got to agree that you should start naming your posts again. Being one of the readers who originally called you out when you gave up the "ball" thing after only a few posts I would apologize to any readers who cannot easily search your archives. The blog is great and even more impressive considering you have to put up with nonsense responses from people like myself and khandor (well mostly khandor).

Anonymous said...

You seem to be putting your thresholds right where Bargnani will fit. So naturally, he will look good in the comparison because nearly everyone in the group is better than him. Instead of taking a wider range and realizing that Bargnani fits somewhere within that wider group.

eyebleaf said...

BALL WILL LIVE FOREVER.

Anonymous said...

LOL what a retarded post. The only thing worse than a sports blog where an "analyst" with no particular special knowledge spews intuitive guesswork is when an "analyst" with no particular special knowledge spews intuitive guesswork "backed up" with random stats. None of these statistics mean anything until you've determined the weight they have with respect to the probability of winning a basketball game. Until you do that, you're just using them in an ad hoc way to support what are fundamentally the same intuitive opinions.